Friday, May 12, 2017

The Carpenter's Cursed Creature

The final freak-out story from the August 1952 issue of Web of Mystery #12, (and yep, another FULL ISSUE presentation here at THOIA, check the last 3 posts, as well as The Silver Bell of Doom already in the archive from way back 2008!) And OMG-- did I save the bat shittin' best yarn for last?! Let's take a vote on this crazy ass collection of Ace classics, shall we?

12 comments:

It wouldn't have been as insane with just a little editing, but that's one of the things that makes pre-code interesting and fun -- this stuff was meant to be done fast and not necessarily to last. Editing wasn't the biggest concern. Therefore you get all sorts of crazy, like almost murdering your assistant in one panel and now you are chums again in the second one; or somebody being strangled by being spun around!

My one complaint is the wooden monster. If a famous horror producer wanted a horrible monster, he could do a lot better than a low-rent Frankenstein's Monster with a spike on it's head! Give it a tail! Wings! Scales! Big Teeth! More heads! Come on, this guys movies must have been boring!

Wow. I really dig the character design and rendering on that weather vane monster (and how very poetic that part of a weather vane's vicious marauding includes pointing out Lon's little lies and vacillations between sanity and lunacy: "I am but mad north-northwest: when the wind is southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw"). But ultimately I don't know what the big deal was. For one thing, couldn't Lon have just whittled that creature on down to a bit prettier, and been done with it? And for that matter, a close police examination of the evidence (page four, panel seven) indicates that Montmorency committed suicide by strangling himself. How they gonna make that into a murder rap?

Web of Mystery #12 is a very unique comic story-wise! An interesting wooden Golem/Frankenstein monster spin here for sure. The dream logic plotting of this one was a little bewildering, but I went with it. I was actually cheering the monster on when he confronted that little harlot who made both these guys miserable or dead while jumping back and forth between them.

I would have liked to have seen better rendering of the weather vane appendage on top of his head -- maybe made into a more distinctive and elaborate spike like one of those old Prussian officer helmets. There's something poetic and eerie about a monster who has a weather vane on top of his head showing which way the wind blows literally and figuratively story-wise, and it would have been cool to see that put to use in a panel somehow. As it is, it comes off like a phallic symbol on top of his head in many panels! And my mind kept wandering to thinking about this monster being a metaphor for Lon being impotent. Sure, maybe I'm reading too much into it, but he did create a giant substitute woody and made it come to life!

Following up on Brian Barnes comment, if you thought this wooden creature was bad, compare it to Tabanga from the movie "From Hell It Came" (which received the infamous insult from a movie critic "And to hell it can go!")

Damn! I just read THE SILVER BELL OF DOOM in your archives from this issue and it is a solid contender with THE FOOTLIGHT FURIES! Truly this is one of the great gems of pre-code horror comics! What a comic!

Vic really needed to work on his timing. When you and your boss are on a high roof, trying to put a big wooden statue in the right place, you don't just tell the boss, "Oh, by the way, I'm seeing your girlfriend."

"If a famous horror producer wanted a horrible monster, he could do a lot better than a low-rent Frankenstein's Monster with a spike on it's head! Give it a tail! Wings! Scales! Big Teeth! More heads! Come on, this guys movies must have been boring!"

I reckon, Brian, he probably had a hand in 'The Giant Claw' (1957). The squawking, balding space-buzzard featured in that classic would appeal.

Your Horrible Host of Horrors

(aka Steve Banes) Editor / co-editor of IDW's Chilling Archives of Horror Comic Books: ZOMBIES, RETURN OF THE ZOMBIES, and DEVIL TALES, as well as co-host of the bi-monthly HAUNTED HORROR comic series and HAUNTED LOVE miniseries. (All image scans and photography by me from items found in my own personal, putrid collection-- except where noted.)

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